Expand recycling pickup, reduce trash pickup: Marechal

In response to Tom Burkhart's letter to the editor ("Waste Management should acknowledge recycling volume," Jan. 7): Though I am not sure where Burkhart moved from, I would like to relay my experience.

I moved from Portland, Ore. to the Reno-Tahoe area in 2016. Waste Management was also the trash company where I lived in the Pacific Northwest. As some may know, Portland is one of the most progressive cities along the West Coast.

Some time in 2015, I received a notice that the City of Portland had directed Waste Management to initiate recycling pickup every week without cost. This included compost and yard waste. Recycling did not need to be sorted and a separate container was to be provided for yard waste and compost.

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Trash, on the other hand, was to be reduced to biweekly pickup. Anything over the standard-sized can would be considered an additional charge to the base bill for the resident.

When I received this letter, my thoughts were that the city was really off its rocker. How could a family possibly go two weeks without trash pickup? The agenda of the city (I felt at the time) was over the top.

Lo and behold, with a more lenient recycling policy and those compost bins, I was astounded that we really did not need weekly trash pickup! I became a convert and this change was quite easy to adapt to with no real inconvenience to us.

When driving to Oregon from the Tahoe Basin along I-5, I often notice a closed landfill close to the freeway near Salem. It is a giant hill in an area with no hills. The turkey vultures are gone because it is closed, but the land formation looks very foreign.

I can not help but think what lies in the zone below the surface Is it leaching things into the soil (and subsequently the water supply) through underground aquifers? Water becomes more precious every day here on our planet. When are we going to connect the dots that we are destroying that which sustains us?

While some may call it social engineering, perhaps many municipalities can learn something from places like Portland. Waste Management follows the directive of the places they operate in. Maybe some forward-thinking city official might come to realize that UNR could use the compost and food scraps to fertilize their experiments into desert hothouse agriculture.

There are many problems with the way our society has evolved. Some have the potential to create the absolute destruction of human life on Earth. Do we really want our children to inherit the spoils of bad systems and practices?

I think not. For the respect of this beautiful place we all call home and also for the sake of our children, maybe it is time to inconvenience ourselves a bit. Practices like this simple transition into more robust recycling might allow us to pass the baton to the next generation without shame.